LONGFELLOW & THE FORGING OF AMERICAN IDENTITY

The curricular resources you will find on this page were developed by thirty teachers from Maine and Massachusetts who participated in an intensive two-year (2003-2004) study of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's life and poetry that was organized by the Maine Humanities Council. The program was designed to explore ways of bringing Longfellow's work back into the curriculum in a dynamic and meaningful way—in English, Social Studies, American Studies, Art, Music, and other subjects.

Participants read and discussed Longfellow's work extensively, met regularly with scholars, and visited important Longfellow-related sites and archives. The program culminated with the teachers own research projects. Each participating teacher did extensive archival research on a literary or historical aspect of Longfellow's work and created the teaching resources you will find below.

The Longfellow Institute, as the program is known, was funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and led by scholar Charles Calhoun, author of the recently published biography, Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life (Beacon Press, 2004). Program speakers included museum curators, archivists, and specialists in 19th-century American literature, history, art, architecture, and popular culture.

The focus of the Institute was not only on Longfellow's poetry but on his cultural impact and legacy in creating such enduring American icons as Paul Revere, Evangeline, Priscilla Alden, and (more controversially) Hiawatha. The teachers also examined the poet's life in the context of his family and his many friends, including Hawthorne, Emerson, Charles Sumner, Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Fanny Kemble, and Oscar Wilde.

The Institute was presented in cooperation with the Maine Historical Society, the Longfellow National Historic Site in Cambridge, MA, Bowdoin College, and other cultural agencies. This was the first program of its kind in the country, and an original and enduring contribution to the "recovery" of Longfellow in American culture.

Longfellow Meets German Radical Poet Ferdinand Freiligrath

Suitable for upper level literature classes prepared to discuss the slavery controversy in ante-bellum America and the role of American literature as a vehicle of social criticism. A background in the rise of political radicalism in Germany and France leading up to the revolutions of 1848 is suggested but not required.

The American Wilderness? How 19th Century American Artists Viewed The Separation Of Civilization And Nature

Students will learn to connect literature to the culture and historical context to which it belongs. They will also be able to recognize and explore the role that ethnocentrism played in relationships between American settlers and native peoples.

Students and teachers will examine LongfellowÂs ability to express universality of human emotions/experiences as well as looking at the patterns he articulates in history that are applicable well beyond his era. With each poem, students will explore a common set of central guiding questions.

Longfellow and Dickens: The Story of a Trans-Atlantic Friendship

Students will use a variety of documents to explore the relationship between Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Charles Dickens. Students will make connections between various texts, and put the friendship between the two men into a societal and historical context.

Longfellow and the Jewish Cemetery at Newport

Longfellow's poem "The Jewish Cemetery at Newport" opens up the issue of the earliest history of the Jews in America, and the significant roles they played as businessmen and later benefactors to the greater community. The history of the building itself is notable in terms of early American architecture, its having been designed, apparently gratis, by the most noted architect of the day. Furthermore, the poem traces the history of Newport as kind of a microcosm of New England commercial cities before the industrialization boom. For almost any age student the poem could be used to open up interest in local cemeteries, which are almost always a wealth of curiousities and history. Longfellow and his friends enjoyed exploring cemeteries, and today our little local cemeteries can be used to teach little local histories and parts of the big picture as well.

Longfellow's "The Village Blacksmith" and "Whitman's Song of Myself": Alternative Constructions of the American Worker

Author: Mark Gorey, English teacher, Boothbay Region High School, MaineSuggested Grade Level: 11-12Subject Areas: American Literature and American History

Longfellow and Whitman both wrote with sympathy about the American worker, although their respective portraits are strikingly different, and worth juxtaposing. These poems offer a starting place for comparison and contrast. Read more widely in the work of both poets and decide for yourselves which poet speaks to you more meaningfully and why.

This exhibit examines why the Longfellows arrived in Gorham, Judge LongfellowÂs role in the history of the town, Henry Wadsworth LongfellowÂs vacations in the country which may have influenced his greatest work, and the remains of the Longfellow estate still standing in Gorham today.

Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie--Selected Lines and Illustrations

Students will gain an understanding of the relationship between art and literature. This exhibit will demonstrate to students how visual art (in this case, ink drawings) can enhance their comprehension of a literary work. They will also have the opportunity to create their own illustrations of other Longfellow poems.
Students will gain an understanding of the relationship between art and literature. This exhibit will demonstrate to students how visual art (in this case, ink drawings) can enhance their comprehension of a literary work. They will also have the opportunity to create their own illustrations of other Longfellow poems.

The Exile of the People of Longfellow's Evangeline

Students research using a variety of primary and secondary sources and write an editorial. The editorial will first explain the main points of Lt. Gov. LawrenceÂs Deportation Orders. Second, the editorial will present a point of view with support concerning the removal of the Acadians.

The Village Blacksmith: The Reality of a Poem

Introduction
The Village Blacksmith was a much celebrated poem. Written of course, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the poem appeared to celebrate the work ethic and mannerisms of a working man, the icon of every rural community, the Blacksmith. However, what was the poem really saying?

These lessons will introduce the world-famous American writer and a selection of his work with a compelling historical fiction theme. Students take up the quest: Who was HWL and did his poetry leave footprints on the sands of time? They will "tour" his Cambridge home through young eyes, listen, and discuss poems from a writerÂs viewpoint, and create their own poems inspired by Longfellow's works.

These lessons were developed for seventh graders. The lesson plans can stand on their own or they can be integrated into language arts, social studies or even a science curriculum. Teachers should feel free to adapt and use these plans to suit their needs. The objectives and activities are suggested as a starting point. It is my hope that after teachers and students are exposed to this sampling of Longfellow's poetry they will be motivated to read and study more of his works.

Longfellow Amongst His Contemporaries: The Ship of State DBQ

Author: William J. Murphy, English and History Teacher, Belfast Area High School, MaineSuggested Grade Level: 10-12Subject Area: American literature, American history, composition

Students will be required to use the accompanying documents and their knowledge of the period 1783-1865 to assess the validity of this statement:
The ship of state metaphor represents an effective strategy for depicting the social values and political conflicts that characterize the state of the Union during the crucial decades between the Revolution and the Civil War.

My Lost Youth: Longfellow's Portland, Then and Now

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow loved his boyhood home of Portland, Maine. Years after his childhood, in 1855, he wrote "My Lost Youth" about his undiminished love for and memories of growing up in Portland. This exhibit, using the poem as its focus, will present the Portland of Longfellow's boyhood. In many cases the old photos will be followed by contemporary images of what that site looked like in 2004.